A spring like no other
by JasonsPancake
Summary: Shiraishi had always admired Tanaka from a distant. So when she was told that he knew about her interest in him, it would be an understatement to say that she was shocked.
1. Chapter 1

The grass was swaying in the gentle morning breeze. The school was awefully quiet as it was still pretty early.

Shiraishi fixed her skirt around it's hem and looked out at the school entrance once more before taking off towards her classroom.

She had always been the first to show up. She felt that it was her duty to be there in class if anyone needed her.

But to her shock, she caught sight of a black-haired boy leaning his head on his hand. He slightly moved his head to see who had come.

"Tanaka-kun? You're early today." Shiraishi walked into the class, feeling nervous. She had never been alone with him like that.

Tanaka put his arm down when he realised who it was. "Shiraishi-san.. Good morning. I came to school early so that I can be ready for when the classes start. Classes used to start right after I came in and that always put me off.."

Shiraishi nodded understandingly. "It always is better to be on time for everything and take things at a slow pace."

She sat down on her seat and glanced over at Tanaka who had gone back to blankly staring out the window. She admired his way of thinking, although it was a bit out of the ordinary at times.

She had forgotten the fact that she had been staring at him for 3 minutes when Tanaka snapped his head to the side, catching her red-handed. "Something wrong, Shiraishi-san?"

The flustered girl's face turned bright red and she looked away immediately. "N-N-No! Nothing like that.. I was just.. lost in space."

"His eyes really are like a void of darkness." A voice had barged into their conversation. "Can't really blame you, Shiraishi."

Shiraishi and Tanaka had looked to see who had come in. A girl with short blonde hair and sharp eyes painting the image of a rebellious delinquent stood in their visual space, with one hand on her hip.

"Shiraishi I came to tell you something.. would you spare me a minute?"

"Uh.. S-sure." Shiraishi and Echizen exited the classroom.

Echizen slammed her hand on the wall next to Shiraishi making her flinch.

A random girl walking by had seen a persuasive rebel after the nerdy goody-two-shoes making a very effective move on her.

she screamed before running away fron the scene that she was too innocent and pure to witness.

meanwhile, Echizen and Shiraishi were having a serious talk. "You like Tanaka??"

Shiraishi finally surrendered. "but how did you know?"

"Miyano had accidently spilled it to me after she got high on sugar yesterday." Echizen said. "But that's not the point! The other day when you were talking to yourself and you had said that you liked his food, you were trying to hide the fact that it was actually him that you liked weren't you?"

Shiraishi nodded, accepting an inevitable doom that was awaiting her now that Echizen finally knew. "Echizen, pleeeease don't tell anyone."

"oh you can trust me, Shiraishi.. but.." A serious look took over her face and the crease between her eyebrows wrinkled up in concern.

"but what?"

"Tanaka knows already."


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: '_' -Thoughts** **"_" -Speech**

"What?!" shiraishi was visibly terrified at what Echizen had informed her.

"Yeah, it was during lunch break yesterday. Tanaka was right there when Miyano had told me."

The restless strawberry-blonde haired girl bit her lip nervously.

'There's no way that he was paying attention to their conversation.. right?' Shiraishi thought to herself. When has he ever paid any attention to anything related to her?

"I'm not the world's greatest face reader but Tanaka did look over at us the moment the secret got out." Echizen informed her, making the poor girl fall onto the floor.

"Shiraishi-san, are you okay?" Echizen tried helping her up, worried about the hard impact her knees must have felt against the hard wooden floor.

"I'm okay, Echizen-san.. I'm really.. okay.." Shiraishi said, a dark shadow covering over her eyes.

"I don't really know much about love but I thought I should let you know about this.." Echizen told her, a sympathetic look on her face. "I hope I didn't upset you?"

"No, I'm not upset!" She assured her. "Thank you for telling me, Echizen-san."

'I could live my whole life not knowing that Tanaka knows about my feelings. How embarrassing! If this gets out to the rest of the class, my reputation is bound to go down.' Shiraishi internalised. 'And not to mention Tanaka would have a hard time too.."

More and more kids started filling up the classrooms and Echizen eventually left to go to her own classroom.

Shiraishi had a hard time going into her own classroom. She wanted to act as normal as she could, but ended looking very awkward and unnatural.

Her class was almost half-full. She glanced over at Tanaka who was spacing out.

'Wait, if Tanaka knows already.. why hasn't he mentioned anything about it to me? Well of course he wouldn't, idiot. He prefers to avoid situations like this as much as he can.'

"Shiraishi."

'But doesn't that mean that he doesn't want to aknowledge my feelings? Which means that he doesn't like me back after all..'

"Shirashi!"

'Well I guess him avoiding the subject is the best for both of us. If he doesn't bring it up, I can act like I don't know about him knowing that I like him.'

"Shiraishi!!"

"Oh, sensei, I'm sorry.. I was lost in thought."

"That's very unlike you Shiraishi, You're starting to act like Tanaka these days."

Shiraishi's heart skipped a beat at the mention of Tanaka's name. She quickly went over to her seat while the teacher took attendance.

A few minutes later, she could feel someone looking at ger. She then turned left to spot Tanaka looking at her with that blank face of his.

"A-Anything wrong, Tanaka-kun?" She asked nervously.

'Oh no, Is he gonna talk about that?'

"You know.. I heard something yesterday."

"Y-Y-Yeah?? What is it?"

"I'll talk to you about it after school. I don't think it's fair if I say it here, where there is a possibility that somebody might overhear us."

'oh no... he really heard it then..'

 **AN: I'm sorry for the short chapter but I've been really busy lately with my Alevels coming up this May. I'll try updating on the weekends. And thank you so much for the nice reviews on the last chapter.**


	3. Chapter 3

Tanaka sighed heavily, almost losing his balance on the bench before Shiraishi held him back in place. They had decided to talk during lunch break.

"So Tanaka-kun, what did you hear about me?" Shiraishi nervously asked.

"I would normally never confront anyone about this but you're my friend, Shiraishi-san." Tanaka said looking directly at her. "And it's not fair if I ignore it."

Struggling to maintain eye-contact, she looked down to her lap, biting her lip.

 _Well here comes the rejection._

"I heard you fell down the stairs."

"It's okay, I understand that you don't feel the sa- wait, what?" Her eyes shot back up to his face, that displayed a blank expression. The blank expression.

"Yeah, Oota said that he was right behind you when it happened." Tanaka calmly replied. "I'm sorry that I didn't ask you about it right after I heard it. I am a terrible friend."

"No no no Tanaka-kun, you're a great friend. I'm happy that you're worried about me." Shiraishi assured, feeling a bolt of joy as she realised that Tanaka was indeed still oblivious to her interest in him. "And don't worry, I'm fine.. see?" She twirled around.

"That's a relief."

"Well, I have to head back to class now. You should too." Shiraishi said before walking towards their classroom.

Oota joined him on the bench as soon as she left. "So why didn't you tell her?"

Tanaka plopped himself onto Oota's shoulders. "Let's go back to class."

"Are you just trying to protect her feelings? Because you don't feel the same way?" Oota asked him out of curiosity.

Tanaka didn't utter a single word on their short journey. He spotted Shiraishi jotting down something at the front of the classroom. She instantly beamed at the sight of him.

It made him feel a pang of guilt. Not even willing to spare her a normal wave, he looked away. Shiraishi didn't think too much into it but felt a bit hurt.

She found it a bit weird that he was being so distant throughout the day. More than usual. She thought that they had established a mutual friendship not too long ago. Had he changed his mind?

"Tanaka-kun?" Shiraishi had asked after English period. "Are you mad at me?"

Tanaka didn't look at her but muttered a single "no" enough for her to hear.

"Then whats wrong? Did something bad happen to you?" Shiraishi asked, wanting to get to the bottom of whatever was going on.

"No. everything is fine, Shiraishi-san."

To their surprise, a swarm of boys from another class rushed into their classroom. One of them was holding a guitar and the others were holding pieces of papers that spelled out "Will you be my girlfriend?"

The one with the guitar started singing a sweet melody that made almost every girl in the class swarm. At the end of the song, he walked over to Shiraishi and kissed her hand. He then stepped back and bowed down at a 90 angle. "Will you go out with me, Shiraishi-san?"

Although she was a bit flustered, she couldn't find it in her heart to reject his efforts and embarrass him Infront of her classmates. "Y-yes?"

She had never been asked out so directly before and she always brushed off subtle hints that the other boys had given her.

There was a loud roar when Shiraishi had accepted. The boy smiled at her before grabbing her hand and walking out of the class, his friends right behind them.

"That was quite a surprise wasn't it, Tanaka?" Oota had asked, walking towards him, crossing his arms over his chest.

There was no reply from Tanaka.

"Tanaka?"

There was a sudden snap that made Oota jump. He looked around to see a broken pencil on the floor, snapped in half.

He looked up to see Tanaka who was groaning in pain.

"Did you just snap that pencil?" Oota asked, reaching over to help him "How, why?"

 **A/N: hey guys. Long time no see. I hope you enjoyed this chapter as much as I enjoyed writing it.** **My exams are officially over so you can expect more frequent updates.** **Also, just out of curiousity, what are your (my readers') genders? I've seen more support towards TanakaXShiraishi in the male side of the fandom than the female side, who are more inclined towards the OotaXTanaka ship.**


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